Releasing My First Single as an Independent Artist

Last week, I officially released my first ever piece of music as my own, independent artist, “take my time” beneath the stage name rishijey. I released the single on all major streaming platforms–Spotify, Apple Music, SoundCloud, YouTube Music, and the rest. Not only was the song my first experience releasing music, but it was my first ever time writing lyrics, singing the song myself, mixing vocals, mastering the track, and handling distribution. 

I began work on the song in August, when I wrote a basic melody for the verse and some lyrics about a lack of reciprocation in a relationship. Most songwriters tend to formulate songs in their head, then go straight to a microphone. However, I had an interesting approach to the process. As my background lies in producing instrumentals, I actually wrote the melody for the song into MIDI at first. I treated the song as if it were to be an instrument in any other beat I made, however, it evolved into an entire composition. Since it was my first time writing, I spent two to three weeks refining the lyrics, until I was finally ready to record.

At this point, I’d had the intention of evolving from a music producer to a recording artist for a few months, and I had even been purchased a recording microphone–the Blue Bluebird SL–for my birthday. However, I was yet to record any music, or even sing, for that matter. This was my first time ever experimenting with my own vocals. As a result, I re-recorded at least nine different versions of the song in an effort to teach myself how to sing. Of course, I am no Celine Dion, so I still had to use some Melodyne and AutoTune–which we’ve talked about in a previous article–to make my pitches more accurate. Eventually, after recording plenty of versions, I decided to finish the song with the vocals I had.

I co-produced the song along with Chris Marek, a fantastically talented producer without whom the song would not exist. Marek played the guitar, played the synths and 808, and sent me the melody that I used as the base of the instrumental. I initially recorded the song as a slow, guitar ballad. However, after the ninth-or-so version of the vocals, I decided to speed up the tempo, add drums, and turn the song into a fun, pop, trap, hyperpop-inspired track. 

After mastering the song with the help of AI-driven website LANDR, I released the song to all streaming platforms using DistroKid, a music distribution service incredibly popular among independent musicians without the support of a record label to handle distribution for them. Months of planning paid off once I released the track this past Friday, February 3rd 2023. The release saw a flood of support from my friends, family, and peers. It was heartwarming when I went to school that day, saw it reposted on everybody’s social media, playing on people’s phones in the cafeteria, and even had students whom I didn’t know approach me in the hallway to tell me how much they liked the piece. To call the release “rewarding” would be an understatement.

Stream the song on all platforms here!